Curiosity Killed the Cat
by tigerlily25
Summary: In future, Tony might think twice before probing into McGee's love life. General bullpen silliness and team banter as a break from post-Aliyah angsting. AU - very minor reference to BtVS. Tony/Ziva.


**Author's Note**: Despite the crossover tag, this one is pretty much all about Team NCIS, the way they used to be back when they weren't all sniping at one another. Silly, cracky hilarity as a break from post-Aliyah angsting. If you've followed me here from the world of non-crossover NCIS fic, stick around - no great knowledge of BtVS canon required.

If you _have_ been reading the Gunpowder series of ficlets, this comes after Playing the Hero. Set sometime after 6.14 'Love and War', but well before the last few episodes of Season 6 - but note that the series itself is somewhat of an AU and this is no exception.

Hope you enjoy!

* * *

The elevator doors announce the addition of another person to the hustle and bustle of the squad room with a subtle chime, and Tony glances up briefly from his ringside seat to the comings and goings of NCIS, before turning his attention back to his horribly overdue report.

It's just McGee. Nothing to see here.

Wait.

"Probie," he says in a tone that makes the mostly un-distractible Ziva look up from whatever she's doing at her desk (possibly plotting her next night-time assault on his person, the thought of which makes him wish he'd chosen larger pants this morning). "Didn't you get the memo? Looking that pleased with yourself is now a Federal crime. Punishable by death, or gross misuse of office supplies as interrogative tools."

Ziva looks briefly interested at the vague mention of adding an entry to her 'death by paperclip' master list, but seconds later decides that he is joking and returns to her work, though her eyes stray to McGee speculatively. Tony thinks he should be more disturbed by this, but there's nothing like a little ninja-esque contemplation to get his blood pumping in the morning.

He uses his handily stashed pocket mirror to do a rearview Gibbs-check. Nope. No sign of the boss. With the coast apparently clear, he takes the opportunity to discreetly check his teeth for remainders of breakfast burrito.

Wouldn't do to be smiling at Ziva in a way that he hopes is less 'I'm slightly unhinged' and more 'let's have hot sex in the elevator' with bacon in his teeth. Even if her adherence to kosher laws seems to come and go according to whether she can be bothered cooking him bacon and eggs in the morning.

_Lookin' good, DiNozzo_.

Back to business then. "What did you get up to last night, McSneaky?"

McGee just grins at him and continues the trek to his desk, whistling under his breath. Tony watches him move with narrowed eyes.

"You form a one-geek assault team on whatever online nerd paradise you're currently inhabiting, and wipe out the competition with the touch of a button?" he asks, lifting an eyebrow as McGee sits in his chair (damn, should have gone through with the dastardly plan to remove all the screws. Worked a treat on Ziva, after all…)

"Nope."

The junior agent types jauntily – if one can call such a movement jaunty without sounding like a slightly deranged Gilbert and Sullivan fan. Pirates of the Caribbean shits all over Pirates of Penzance, even if Abby keeps trying to teach him the lyrics to Modern Major General once they've got a few drinks into them on Friday nights.

He doesn't give a damn about the square of the hypotenuse, no matter how much beer he's had. He'll have to suggest that line to Abby the next time she makes an attempt. Fits the rhythm and all.

Maybe some of it's slowly starting to sink into his brain. Gah!

"Finally gave in and visited that site that…" Ziva clears her throat meaningfully. "…er, that I did not know anything about and certainly did not recommend?"

"Nuh-uh," McGee answers in a wholly annoying tone.

Running out of options here.

Tony glances meaningfully at Ziva, who among many other talents is quite skilled in getting sensitive information out of people. Though he hopes that she doesn't intend to handcuff a naked McGee to the headboard and… mmm, handcuffs.

"You are grinning like a madwoman," Ziva informs him matter-of-factly.

"Mad_man_, Zee-vah," he corrects absently, then frowns at her. Sometimes he gets the feeling that she messes her idioms up on purpose, because honestly, if she can learn all those languages _surely_ she can grasp the difference between masculine and feminine.

"I said what I said," she counters with a shrug.

He resolves to not answer the doorbell when she rings tonight as payback for the slight, but then remembers that it will take her all of about five seconds to pick the lock anyway. Maybe he'll just refuse her advances in the bedroom like the strong and resolute man that he…

Glaring at her is appropriate enough punishment, he decides. No sense in hurting them _both_.

"Do you not trust us with your secrets, McGee?" she asks coyly, padding over to his desk and perching on the edge with slightly more of a cat-like lean than is entirely appropriate in the workplace.

He gulps in the face of full Ziva-flirt, and Tony tries very hard not to think about how many men she has practiced said charm on. Especially those that never lived to tell the tale.

"Are you kidding?" McGee asks after a beat. "The last time I told Tony one of my secrets, he wrote it on the wall of the men's room."

"Oh, that was you?" Ziva says with a grin, turning back to Tony. "The handwriting was surprisingly legible."

"What were you doing in the… never mind," McGee trails off, remembering the Mossad liaison's complete disregard for washroom signs. "Anyway, I might trust _you_, Ziva, but you tell Tony everything, and that makes you untrustworthy by association."

"Do I need to remind you two who is Senior Field Agent and therefore has the power to make you check and re-check your field reports until you go _blind_?"

They turn and stare at him in tandem. Ziva is the first to crack, a slow and wholly unlikeable grin spreading across her face. "I hear that there are other things that, when repeated out of necessity, can make a person go blind," she says with a pointed downward flick of her eyes. Tony blinks at her in horror.

McGee appears to choke a little on the sexual innuendo in the air. Weak.

"I haven't even had my first cup of coffee yet, and you two are already in full eyesex mode," he complains. Tony blinks as it dawns on him in a rush that has nothing to do with the way Ziva's eyes linger on his groin. Eyesex.

_Sex_.

"Probie got probed last night!" he says triumphantly, jumping up from his chair as McGee's face blushes a whole new level of scarlet.

In the spirit of his (well, Ziva helped a_ little_) success, he almost does a little dance on the spot, but remembers at the last minute that there are in fact other people in the squad room. It wouldn't do to have them see him dancing like a loon over uncovering his male team members' sex life. It's not at all manly.

"I think there are some people in the Rota office who didn't quite catch that, Tony, could you speak up next time?" McGee mutters darkly, doing his very best to avoid their gazes.

Quick scan of the room for silver haired authority figures. Negative. Proceed with original line of questioning.

"So where did you two crazy kids meet? Was there a surprise Star Wars convention organized last night? That why you never showed at the Duke?" Tony asks instead, sitting back down and wheeling his chair over to invade McGee's workspace. Ziva promptly props her feet on the edge, ignoring his half-hearted attempt to push them off.

McGee abandons all pretences of working and pushes his chair back slightly. He studies Tony with a grin that quickly turns to something approaching a smirk. Tony doesn't like that look on McGee. It makes his face look wrong somehow.

It makes him look like Tony.

"Oh, I was there." He says. "Actually, Tony, I met her in the parking lot."

Tony blinks. "It doesn't count as a conquest if you have to _pay_ for it, McSyphilis." Ziva nudges the side of his leg with her boot, a silent warning that he promptly ignores. "Hope you used protection, at least, otherwise your twenty bucks worth of quick and dirty in the alley might lead to suspicious itching and the sudden need for penicillin."

The hint of smirk dials up a few notches to 'blinding.' "I didn't. Pay for it, that is. She found _me_."

"And when you say found…"

"Popped her head in my window and asked if I planned to join her at the bar," McGee says through all his smug.

Well, this is something unexpected. Tony considers the new information carefully before deciding on his next move.

After all, as a celebrated author McGee is probably used to coming up with a great story. Or at least taking something he's seen in real life and bastardizing it so that it passes as award-winning fiction.

Someone's mother probably asked him for directions last night and his Gemcity persona substituted the rest.

"I do not recall seeing you inside at all last night, McGee," Ziva says curiously, pre-empting Tony's strike. She looks almost proud of his dating success. That won't do. Tony snakes his hand up the leg of her cargo pants and rubs her calf muscle briefly.

"Too busy to shave your legs in the shower this morning, sweet cheeks?"

She smacks his hand away. "I was, but in future I will have to ensure that I am not… hmm, led astray… while washing, yes?"

Distraction plan, epic backfire.

"I like my women hairy," he adds quickly, suppressing the shudder. "No need to waste valuable shower time on shaving. Besides, it's almost winter. The added fur coat will keep you warm, like a polar bear."

"You should know, my little hairy butt."

"…."

"I just threw up a little in my mouth," McGee says under his breath in disgust.

Lovely.

"Ziva asked you a question, Probalicious. What stopped you from introducing your new lady love to your closest friends last night?" Tony's almost willing to wager that McGee's new lady friend either a) is not the kind of girl you show off or b) exists in his head.

It might be a little cruel to think that way, but no certainly no _less_ so than pretending to be an interested party via the wonderfully anonymous internet, despite how badly _that_ seemingly masterful plan turned out.

Level 5 Sorceress. That should have been the giveaway to the level of potential fail right there.

"Two things, really," McGee says slowly and with a hint of something in his tone that makes Tony study the junior agent more closely. "First, you've already met her."

"Oh?" Ziva says, raising her eyebrows in surprise. At least he's not the only one whose mind jumped straight to Deep Six-ish conclusions. He starts running down the list of women that they might have in common.

Abby. Dating Xander Harris, ICWS Agent extraordinaire and so far mostly unimpressed by the DiNozzo charm, though last night seemed to mark the beginning of a considerable thaw.

Ziva. No way. Although… no. No. Way.

Mailroom Chick with the blonde hair, name… something that ends in a 'y'. Sandy? Mandy? _Not important_. Cynthia. Coffee shop employees. Hot nameless girl from the iPod photos… no, that turned out to be his sister. Cleaning staff?

"In _person_?" Tony asks before he thinks about the implications of his line of questioning. Surely McGee's forgotten that whole mess by…

"You don't remember the wild night we shared, honeybuns? I'm crushed." McGee cuts in quickly and faux-sweetly as Tony fights the urge to deliver a self-headslap. He just _had_ to re-open that can of worms. He shoves Ziva's feet from his chair when she snorts at the comment, only to have her promptly replace them… on his lap.

Hmm.

"Red light behaviour, Officer David," he reminds her, half hoping that this will be another one of those times when she chooses to ignore orders unless they suit her goal. She ignores him. Win!

Though… her boots are damned heavy, and creeping dangerously close to his –

"Two, she was all kinds of horny after staking the vampires that decided to throw a party in the bushes near my car, and couldn't wait to… how did she put it? Oh yeah, 'ride me at a gallop until my eyes rolled back in my head, and squeeze me until I popped like warm champagne.' I'm pretty sure that was it."

"That's nice, Probie," Tony mutters absently, his eyes on the approaching foot.

Wait.

Rewind.

_What? _

"I just had this weird moment where I hallucinated you telling us that a _Vampire Slayer_ made you her he-bitch for the night," Tony says carefully once he's finished choking on his own saliva. His back is aching from where an overeager ninja whacked it.

He might let her kiss it better later, if she's lucky.

"Not _a_ vampire slayer," McGee says, looking for all the world like he's just won the sex story lottery. Tony breathes a half relieved, half disappointed sigh.

"_The_ Vampire Slayer. Or at least, one of the original Sunnydale slayers. The Chosen Two, I think Xander calls them. You've met Faith, haven't you?"

Not even Ziva's reflexes can stop Tony from falling off his chair with an unceremonious crash, and in a stunning display of impeccable timing, Gibbs chooses that moment to stride into the bullpen. Ziva hesitates, torn between helping him up and retreating to the safety of her desk.

"DiNozzo, there better be a good reason why you're practically kissing the ground at McGee's feet, and it better have something to do with your finished report being on its way to my desk," Gibbs says warningly as Tony splutters on the floor.

McGee. Faith. Champagne. _Fuck. _

He might be all reformed and whatever now, and happier than he ever thought possible with Ziva, but the ex-playboy inside him is groaning at the irony of the Probie having a Slayer-shaped notch on his relatively unmarked belt.

Gibbs toes him with a boot, and not in a 'gentle reminder nudge' kind of way. At least he didn't aim for the head. There's plenty of trauma going on up there already without Gibbs' boot adding to it.

"Get up, and gear up. Got a dead petty officer in Anacostia."

Tony DiNozzo – notorious golden-tongued ex-playboy – is all out of words. All that's left is shock and an inappropriate amount of awe (given that his partner-slash-girlfriend is standing inches away and is still a very hot and deadly assassin, even if she lacks Slayer strength), though he'd rather make himself a eunuch with his own stapler than admit that to McGee.

"I think you broke him, McGee," he hears Ziva say with no small amount of amusement.

"Not broken," he says darkly, climbing to his feet and grabbing his gun from the drawer. "Just… okay, a little damaged by the mental image of Probie having hot eye-popping sex, but _totally_ not freaked out. At all. Good for you, McGee."

McGee and Ziva exchange looks as they head for the elevator. Ziva pats him consolingly on the shoulder. "It is very large of you to take the high road, Tony." He doesn't even have the strength to correct her error, and he knows she doesn't miss that fact. Hell, she even gives his arm a little squeeze as they follow Gibbs to the doors, and she's not one for meaningless physical gestures as a rule.

He wonders if Ziva could be convinced to pull a Palmer and have hot and sticky manhood-affirming relations in various parts of the building. Maybe if he phrased it just so…

"Do not even think about it, Tony," she warns him under her breath as soon as he opens his mouth. "I am _not_ having sex with you in the elevator." Fuck, he hates it when she pulls her Mossad mind-reading tricks. In the office, at least.

"What about…"

"If you mention it one more time, I will not be having sex with you _anywhere_ for the next week." Damn, she's pissed about the inappropriate vampire slayer lusting. She's doing that hand-flexing thing. A dead giveaway that she's just itching to go for her knife. DiNozzo Jnr curls up a little in self-preservation.

Best not to stir up the hornet's nest. Those damn hornets know all kinds of dirty assassin tricks, and he's sure he saw her slip a paperclip into her pocket on the way out.

"What's your stance on elevator blowjobs?" he wonders, and then freezes. Did he just…

"Only if you're willing to return the favour, Very Special Agent DiNozzo," Gibbs answers dryly from behind him, and McGee and Ziva snort helplessly with laughter.

Tony wonders idly what the weather's like in Rota this time of year.

* * *

_As always, comments and thoughts are much appreciated. :)_


End file.
